These are pretty unscientific but good enough for me to make some judgments on. The 20mm is indeed a sharp lens but I find the 17mm is performing in line with the rest of the olympus lenses. These are all done on an E-PL5, no adjustments made, shot with a bounce flash at ISO 200. All shot wide open. I varied the distance to make the subject size the same in each picture.

Quick Bokeh Test:
Downrezzed in PS (Bicubic Sharper), save for web as PNG, no other edits.

-The snap focus ring goes closer than indicated... closest marking is .25m but the closest actually measured is .23m (the focus ring moves past the closest mark as well). This is measured from the focal plane.

-With AF and the manual focus ring (non snap), it is possible to focus down to .18m (measured from focus plane). Will post pictures to show this difference.

- The depth of field scale is too conservative. Compared to a 35mm Leica Summicron, at f/16, everything between 1.2m to infinity should be in focus. On the zuiko, it claims at f/22, around only 2m to infinity should be in focus. The Leica is a full frame lens with approximately the same aperture and focal length. I will have to play with the lens snap focused but it is probably safe to assume that at f/11, everything from 1m on will be acceptably sharp.

If Olympus uses a different circle of confusion value there will be different results.

Using this DOF calculator a 35mm lens, on a FF camera @ f16 will less dof than a 17mm lens, on 4/3 sensor @f16, with all else equal .

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Using that calculator at 10ft, a full frame 35mm lens @ f/16 has a near focus limit of 4.58ft. A 17mm lens on m43rds has a near focus limit of 2.84ft. Both have a far limit of infinity.

This means more will be in acceptable focus in the 17mm micro four thirds lens at the same distance and aperture. The depth of field will be wider.

My point is, the depth of field scale on the Olympus lens claims it has shallower depth of field than the Leica. Which shows to me that it is too conservative in what it considers in focus. I'm positive that the Olympus lens, when set to a focal distance of 3m @f/11, will have everything from ~1m to infinity in focus (your dof calculator supports this). But the distance scale when set to 3m makes it seem like neither the 2m or infinity mark will be in acceptable focus.

My point is, the depth of field scale on the Olympus lens claims it has shallower depth of field than the Leica.

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DOF is not a phenomenon of instantly transitioning from indistinguishable blob to tack sharp at a specific distance. There is a gradual transition from out of focus to in focus. In focus is defined by the Circle of Confusion being reduced to a specific diameter. The Circle of Confusion is a variable when calculating DOF. Different lens manufactures use different values when making the calculation. As I stated above, if Leica and Olympus use different values for CoC they will arrive at different DoF values.

DOF is not a phenomenon of instantly transitioning from indistinguishable blob to tack sharp at a specific distance. There is a gradual transition from out of focus to in focus. In focus is defined by the Circle of Confusion being reduced to a specific diameter. The Circle of Confusion is a variable when calculating DOF. Different lens manufactures use different values when making the calculation. As I stated above, if Leica and Olympus use different values for CoC they will arrive at different DoF values.

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I've always been referring to the area of acceptable sharpness. If you can find a calculation for the coc that will give the values Olympus has on this distance scale I will concede that the depth of scale is accurate. But as I said before, in my opinion and through my experience of what is acceptably sharp with this lens, I find the values to be conservative.

This isn't a discussion, it isn't subjective; it's a calculation. It's accurate if it matches the result of a calculation, and not what you or anybody else thinks.

If you don't like the values Olympus picked for calculating DOF, ignore them.

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If its such a concrete calculation, give me the figures. Show me a calculation or formula that mirrors what Olympus has stated here, so we can have a cogent discussion on in what cases the figures are accurate, or how Olympus arrived at these figures. Every DOF calculator I've tried that can take into account the sensor size and specific focal length does not match the distance scale.

And if you don't like my assessment of the depth of field scale, you can ignore it too. I'm relaying this information so that others will also check the depth of field scale against their own way of working. That's what I did and found it inaccurate for me.

And if you don't like my assessment of the depth of field scale, you can ignore it too. I'm relaying this information so that others will also check the depth of field scale against their own way of working. That's what I did and found it inaccurate for me.

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Pretty reasonable approach. I've found the electronic DOF scales on a number of cameras to be far more conservative than my eye when determining "acceptable" sharpness. Which they obviously use conservative COC numbers for - which makes sense because if they're going to err, they should err on the side of tougher standards rather than more relaxed ones. I use the 12mm for zone focus a lot, and will with the 17 too once I have it. I've never looked at the DOF scale on the 12 and doubt I will on the 17. I run my own DOF calculations in DOF Master, using their much more liberal default COC calculations and use those numbers to determine my settings with a new lens. I generally find their numbers much more in line with my own standards for acceptable sharpness than those calculated by the manufacturers.

I know this is an old thread, but I just came across this lens at the shop and didn't buy it, specifically because of the DoF scale issue. It seemed to me to be extremely conservative, so much so that it was virtually useless to me, and that's unacceptable in a lens that's intended to be used for street photography.

Also, having read your prior posts, I don't really think you guys are disagreeing. Given a specified value for acceptable circle of confusion, you can arrive at an appropriate calculation for the depth of field. However, it seems like Olympus was extremely conservative in selecting their value for the acceptable circle of confusion, so the resulting DoF scale frankly sucks. After shooting Leica lenses for street work in the past, I'd expect greater DoF when moving from a 35mm to a 17mm at the same F value.

I know this is an old thread, but I just came across this lens at the shop and didn't buy it, specifically because of the DoF scale issue. It seemed to me to be extremely conservative, so much so that it was virtually useless to me, and that's unacceptable in a lens that's intended to be used for street photography.

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It seems like almost all modern DOF scales are very conservative, given the propensity of digital shooters to pixel peep. But in terms of it being unacceptable in a lens to be used for street photography, to me the DOF scale is FAR less important then the distance scale. DOF is easy enough to figure out to our own tolerances, but without a distance scale there's almost no way to quickly set focus for the zone you want in focus. I keep a cheat sheet of a few key settings in my iphone for each lens I use this way. In m43, that's limited to the 12mm and now the 17mm and the 15mm body cap lens. Without a useful DOF scale, I can still get by pretty easily. Without a distance scale, I'm lost.

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